There is an ecstasy that marks the summit of life,
and beyond which life cannot rise
and beyond which life cannot rise
Beneath me, the Mors stretches insurmountable and endless. In comparison to this feat of nature, I have never been able to understand the admiration of the mountains, or even the sea. There is nothing so harsh, so unforgiving, so beautiful as the desert at dawn. I have been flying since before the sun was up, following a rumor—
Some say he was eaten by the desert,
Some say all Solterrans end that way.
I can envision it. I can imagine him just out of view; over the next dune, golden and soft, waiting for me. The sun, rising, only complete the image—my entire childhood was bathed in a replica of that soft, golden light. His light.
My father once told me the desert cannot help but get inside of anyone who crosses it. The sand sifts into every orifice; into ears and eyes; into mucus and phlegm; into hooves and hair; into mouths and noses. The longer you are there, the more the sand sticks; the more it becomes a way of life, a constant discomfort that at first is unbearable and then one day only an irritant. He told me that those who were born in the desert have it within them their entire lives—I tried to argue, father, I was born in Terrastella— but he would have none of it. It doesn’t matter. I see it in the way sometimes, at your most furious, you glow the color of a sunset on the Mors.
Perhaps he planted the seed that would have me contemplating for the rest of my life what aspects of Solterra I inherited; were they the worst ones? The pride and the fury? The violence of the sun and the ruthlessness of the sand? I cannot help but think that must be it, or else I would not be flying so low over the dunes in pursuit of a feeble hope.
I watch my shadow flit quickly over the crest of each dune, and then descend into the gully between. I attempt to focus on the visual over my internal thoughts; the visual is what I aspire to be. Strong, lithe, quick-flying. My childish down has at last been replaced by strong contour feathers—wings shaped like a falcon’s. Since I first flew—near the time of my father’s disappearance—I have scarcely stopped. It has become my obsession; and the obsession has leaned out my youthful softness into something stronger, less childish and more adolescent, a step closer to being something else—
(Someone, else).
I don’t see the girl, at first.
I see the telltale patterns of sandwyrms swimming beneath the sand.
(And oh, perhaps I will come to understand our differences in this and this alone—I see them and do not marvel at them for the wild things they are, but for what their conquest would mean! Their dance is the dance that calls upon heroes to slay them, and nothing more—until, of course, I see the girl in their midst. It is her gold veining that catches my eye, and then I am enchanted).
It is the first time since he left that I do not think of my father.
It is the first time, brief and ephemeral, that the pain of my abandonment does not turn me radiant red with rage. It is the first time, in weeks, that my light flits from crimson to gold and then to ethereal silver—
I have never seen anything like it. I tip one wing and circle, maintaining the pattern with powerful strokes of my wings. I am marveling at how fearlessly she dances among them, as if their are not beasts underfoot; and the longer I watch, the more I recognize her dance compliments that of the sandwyrms below, so that she is never interfering with their pattern work beneath the sand, only adding to it’s complexity. I wonder, briefly, if I could be imagining it—but know my imagination could create no such image. A girl so wild. A girl so free. And before I can help myself, I am banking down on that desert wind; I follow just behind, above the sands, until I am darting alongside her to say, “How are you not afraid?!”
Even hovering above the earth, flying small circles above her, I feel the telltale shock of adrenaline that comes from being so close to a thing that could, at any moment, decide to kill me—
My father’s words find me again, however. Once you cross the desert, it never leaves you—
and the wind, too, is speaking to my wings—so that before I even recognize it, my flying has become a part of the dance, too.
☾
Some say he was eaten by the desert,
Some say all Solterrans end that way.
I can envision it. I can imagine him just out of view; over the next dune, golden and soft, waiting for me. The sun, rising, only complete the image—my entire childhood was bathed in a replica of that soft, golden light. His light.
My father once told me the desert cannot help but get inside of anyone who crosses it. The sand sifts into every orifice; into ears and eyes; into mucus and phlegm; into hooves and hair; into mouths and noses. The longer you are there, the more the sand sticks; the more it becomes a way of life, a constant discomfort that at first is unbearable and then one day only an irritant. He told me that those who were born in the desert have it within them their entire lives—I tried to argue, father, I was born in Terrastella— but he would have none of it. It doesn’t matter. I see it in the way sometimes, at your most furious, you glow the color of a sunset on the Mors.
Perhaps he planted the seed that would have me contemplating for the rest of my life what aspects of Solterra I inherited; were they the worst ones? The pride and the fury? The violence of the sun and the ruthlessness of the sand? I cannot help but think that must be it, or else I would not be flying so low over the dunes in pursuit of a feeble hope.
I watch my shadow flit quickly over the crest of each dune, and then descend into the gully between. I attempt to focus on the visual over my internal thoughts; the visual is what I aspire to be. Strong, lithe, quick-flying. My childish down has at last been replaced by strong contour feathers—wings shaped like a falcon’s. Since I first flew—near the time of my father’s disappearance—I have scarcely stopped. It has become my obsession; and the obsession has leaned out my youthful softness into something stronger, less childish and more adolescent, a step closer to being something else—
(Someone, else).
I don’t see the girl, at first.
I see the telltale patterns of sandwyrms swimming beneath the sand.
(And oh, perhaps I will come to understand our differences in this and this alone—I see them and do not marvel at them for the wild things they are, but for what their conquest would mean! Their dance is the dance that calls upon heroes to slay them, and nothing more—until, of course, I see the girl in their midst. It is her gold veining that catches my eye, and then I am enchanted).
It is the first time since he left that I do not think of my father.
It is the first time, brief and ephemeral, that the pain of my abandonment does not turn me radiant red with rage. It is the first time, in weeks, that my light flits from crimson to gold and then to ethereal silver—
I have never seen anything like it. I tip one wing and circle, maintaining the pattern with powerful strokes of my wings. I am marveling at how fearlessly she dances among them, as if their are not beasts underfoot; and the longer I watch, the more I recognize her dance compliments that of the sandwyrms below, so that she is never interfering with their pattern work beneath the sand, only adding to it’s complexity. I wonder, briefly, if I could be imagining it—but know my imagination could create no such image. A girl so wild. A girl so free. And before I can help myself, I am banking down on that desert wind; I follow just behind, above the sands, until I am darting alongside her to say, “How are you not afraid?!”
Even hovering above the earth, flying small circles above her, I feel the telltale shock of adrenaline that comes from being so close to a thing that could, at any moment, decide to kill me—
My father’s words find me again, however. Once you cross the desert, it never leaves you—
and the wind, too, is speaking to my wings—so that before I even recognize it, my flying has become a part of the dance, too.
@Diana"speaks" space for notes
